


Great Minds

by Spork_in_the_Road



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Basically the Whole Cast - Freeform, F/M, Ginny is not all sunshine and flowers, Manipulation, Mind Control, Please be warned, Rating and Warnings Subject to Change, Suicidal Thoughts, Tom Riddle is a narcissistic asswagon, and i can't stop writing him, because it's Tom Riddle, dark themes, for now, fuckity duh, i'll tag more people as i go, it's becoming a serious problem, she is a badass warrior goddess, this is sort of canon compliant, what even are these tags, who knows man
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-11-29
Updated: 2018-07-05
Packaged: 2018-09-03 00:24:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 11,576
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8689423
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Spork_in_the_Road/pseuds/Spork_in_the_Road
Summary: There are, surprisingly, worse things than dying on the floor of the Chamber of Secrets after having your soul leeched by the memory of a boy from the 1940's. Like having your mother hover over you and forbid you to ride a broom. Or being watched with pitying eyes wherever you go. Or realizing that the very boy who tried to kill you is not, in fact, dead like everyone believes, but instead lives inside your head.Ginny Weasley is forced to grin and bear it as she navigates school, a somewhat crippled social life, and the horrors of her past. Tom Riddle is just along for the ride.





	1. Chapter 1: Fallout

**Author's Note:**

> I am procrastinating on homework, as per usual, and decided to post a little something I had started working on a while ago. I don't know how often I'll be able to update, especially since I have another multi-chapter fic I'm supposed to be working on - *cough* "THE POWER VACUUM CONUNDRUM" *cough* (I promise I haven't abandoned it). 
> 
> Anyway, I love Tom and Ginny fics -- really I just love Tom, let's be honest -- so I thought I'd write something a bit longer with them. Here we go.

The moment Ginny woke up on the floor of the Chamber of Secrets, she knew something was terribly wrong. She felt fine. Better than fine, actually.

Which, of course, was only troublesome because she should have been dead.

When Harry smiled at her, insisting it was all over, she only watched him with an empty stare and let him lead her out of the Chamber. She held on tight as Fawkes carried them out, held on tight as her mother hugged her and sobbed, held on tight to her father’s hand as they floo-ed to St. Mungos. Ginny hadn’t wanted to go, but Madame Pomfrey had been concerned about her health and Dumbledore had offered to personally pay the expenses. 

It was there that Ginny learned she had been under the Imperious Curse. It was there that Ginny told and re-told the story of what happened, at least the parts she remembered. She told them she didn’t remember what happened in the Chamber before Harry got there. She lied.

She wanted to tell them, but every time she started, the words stuck in her throat. And every time, a voice that was hers, but words that weren’t, told the doctors that the last thing she remembered was eating in the Great Hall. Her mother hugged her throughout, refusing to let go until one of the doctors physically pulled her away.

Later, when the doctors had finally left her alone to rest, ushering her family out of the room, Ginny sagged against her pristine hospital bed.

“You can stop hiding now,” she said tiredly, voice devoid of emotion. To anyone else, it might seem like she was talking to herself. She knew that if any of the doctors saw her, they’d probably lock her up in the mental ward, and she didn’t want that. She couldn’t afford for that to happen.

Tom’s humorless chuckle resonated in her head, and she could almost imagine that he was standing in front of her, just like in the Chamber, and not trapped in her head.

“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” he asked, and Ginny suspected that if he had a corporal form, he’d be sneering. She hated that he could read her thoughts, that they weren’t just hers anymore, but his too. 

She scowled. “I want you out of my head,” she said firmly, her scowl deepening when he laughed. 

“No you don’t,” he said. “Not if it means I’ll be gone.”

“I do want you gone,” she protested. She could feel his smug amusement.

“If you want me gone,” he said slowly, “then why didn’t you tell them I’m not dead, hmm?”

“I tried,” she snapped. 

“No,” he said, and he had adopted the tone he only took when he felt he was explaining something obvious. “You tried to tell them I tethered my soul to you.”

“That’s the same thing.”

“Oh, Ginevra,” he said, chuckling, but he didn’t bother explaining. If she hadn’t been so damn tired, she would have tried annoying him into telling her what he meant. Instead, she just sat there, fuming silently and wishing she could kill him.

“Too bad you can’t do that,” he said, not sounding sorry at all. “Not without killing yourself, at least.”

Ginny tensed suddenly, her mind clinging to the idea that Tom had unintentionally given her. 

“Ginevra,” he said, his dangerously low. “Don’t even think about it.”

She didn’t bother replying, and instead slipped into a restless sleep.

-

She dreamt of Tom, and even in her dream state, she was furious that he was there. If he had to take up her waking hours, shouldn’t he at least give her a break while she slept? It seemed not.

She wasn’t sure if it was actually him, of course, though she wouldn’t have been surprised if he could control her dreams too. They were back in the Chamber, exactly as they had been before she passed out. She stood before him, palm bleeding from where he’d taken her blood.

“You gave it to me,” he said, eyes flicking towards her hand. “I didn’t take anything.”

“You were controlling me,” she said. “I didn’t have a choice.”

He raised a brow. “Didn’t you?” 

She was about to tell him off with words that she’d only recently heard Fred and George use, but her dream shifted, and Tom disappeared. Instead, she stood frozen while hundreds of snakes twisted around her ankles, slithering up her body until they covered every inch of her skin. She couldn’t see, couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe. 

“You will always choose me, Ginevra,” one of the snakes hissed in her ear, but it was Tom’s voice. 

-

“He’s alive,” Ginny said to the first person she saw, who happened to be a trainee nurse. “He’s alive, please, you have to believe me.”

He didn’t, of course. 

“You have every reason to be scared,” he said, voice soothing. “But no one can hurt you here.”

Tom yawned in her head. “Wrong,” he said, and for a moment, Ginny wondered if anyone could hear him but her. The nurse, however, went about his business as usual.

When the aurors came to talk to Ginny in the afternoon, she told them as well.

“What makes you say that?” one of them, a short, balding man, asked. 

She tried to tell them about the soul-tethering ritual Tom had done, but once again, her voice failed her. Ginny felt like screaming. Instead, she shrugged helplessly.

“I just know,” she said. They hadn’t believed her either, and Ginny couldn’t even blame them. What proof did she have? 

“Pity,” Tom said, unhelpfully, as the aurors left. “But it’s not like you wanted them to believe you, anyway.”

Ginny huffed. “I want you gone, Tom. I don’t care if you think otherwise.”

-

In the end, only Dumbledore seemed willing to even consider the prospect of Tom being ‘not dead’, a fact which annoyed Tom immensely.

“I just know,” Ginny said for the thousandth time, eyes pleading with Dumbledore to understand everything she couldn’t say. He considered her carefully. 

“Without evidence,” he said, “there’s not much to be done, I’m afraid.”

Ginny collapsed against her bed, feeling utterly downcast.

“When can I go home?” she asked suddenly. If Dumbledore was startled by her change in topics, he didn’t show it.

“This evening, if you’re feeling up to it,” he said, and she nodded. Once she was home, perhaps life would regain some sense of normality. Perhaps she could learn to ignore Tom. 

-

Ginny’s twelfth birthday party was the biggest she had ever had, and though no one said anything to lead her to believe it, she knew it was because everyone was relieved she was still alive. Tom, it seemed, was in agreement with her for once. 

“This is ridiculous,” he had sneered the moment they had come down the stairs to see the entire kitchen decorated with multi-colored streamers and the largest chocolate cake Ginny had ever seen sitting on the table. “If they were going to thank you for not dying, they should have done it when you got home.”

Ginny ignored him. She was getting better at tuning him out, though he didn’t like being neglected for too long. He still haunted her dreams nearly every night, always leaving her with cryptic words that she could never quite wrap her head around. His commentary on her life persisted, and she supposed it was likely because he had nothing better to do. He was stuck in a twelve-year-old girl’s body, and he couldn’t even take control.

Not that he hadn’t tried. In fact, it was the first thing he had done once everyone finally stopped hovering around her all the time. Ginny had worried that he might be able to take over while she slept, but apparently that hadn’t worked either. Tom had devoted most of three weeks to figuring out why he couldn’t, and eventually decided on the theory that a body wasn’t meant to have two minds, and therefore it was impossible – or extremely improbable, as Tom liked to say – for the parasite to take full control of the host.

Ginny didn’t much care about the ‘why’, but she did care that Tom couldn’t do what he wanted, and his sour mood had greatly improved her own over the past two months. It was only because of this that her parents were considering letting her go back to Hogwarts in September. Her mother was still hesitant, or as Tom called her, neurotic. 

Ginny, unfortunately, had to agree. Molly Weasley had been pushed nearly to the edge of a full mental breakdown because of ‘the incident’ in the Chamber and Ginny’s slow recovery had done nothing to put the woman at ease. She hovered and fussed and worried. The one time she had seen Ginny on a broom since ‘the incident’, Molly had yelled until she was red in the face and then hugged Ginny for an hour. She had sobbed at Ginny’s birthday party, too.

“I’ve never understood parental affection,” Tom said offhandedly.

“I’ll bet there’s a lot you don’t understand,” Ginny snapped back, though she was careful not to do so out loud. 

He snorted. “I’m technically four years older than you, and my intellect is far above what yours will ever be.” Ginny was about to protest, but he cut her off. “Besides,” he said, taking on a smug tone. “Weren’t you just asking me the other day to explain puberty to you?”

She flushed red at the reminder of their conversation. “I didn’t ask you anything. You read my mind and took it upon yourself to tell me.”

“If you didn’t think so loudly, it wouldn’t be a problem.”

“If you weren’t in my head, it wouldn’t be a problem.”

They both knew she was right, and so he didn’t say anything else for the rest of the day.

-

Tom’s presence wasn’t all bad. When he was in a particularly giving mood, he explained some of the finer points of magic to Ginny, often in ways that made more sense than the lessons she had received at school. Though she couldn’t practice at home – Tom repeatedly cursed those “ridiculous laws” – she still felt that she was at an advantage for having Tom as a private tutor.

It also helped that she got a break from him for about four hours every day around noon, when he would finally doze off. Since he had taken to entertaining himself by plaguing her dreams, and thus spent nearly all night awake, he was forced into a long afternoon nap on a daily basis. Ginny tried to reserve certain things for when he was asleep, such as bathing. It was embarrassing enough that he had to come with her every time she went to the bathroom, but she would be damned if she willingly let him witness her taking a bath. 

As it was, Tom managed to remain civil – at least, as much as one could expect from a young dark lord – for the remainder of the summer. His scathing commentary was saved for Ginny’s family, but was rarely directed at her. She was surprised when he made no comment of her second-hand books or her hand-me-down robes, and even more surprised when he told her not to bother purchasing a particularly old potions text, as he had already read – and memorized – the book in his own day. 

“Besides, I’m more useful to you than any potions book,” Tom said smugly. “I was something of a prodigy, you know.” 

Ginny rolled her eyes, but put the book back on the shelf.

She only realized much later that she had done exactly what Tom had wanted her to do.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ginny attends her 2nd year at Hogwarts and struggles with cohabitation.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WARNING: PLEASE READ
> 
> This chapter contains suicidal thoughts from Ginny, and a rather callous handling of them by Tom. It was not easy for me to write -- it was something I didn't want to make light of, yet I didn't want things to get overwhelming -- and I expect for some that it will not be easy to read. If you cannot read this chapter, I completely understand. 
> 
> That said, I don't personally find the mentions of suicidal thoughts in this piece to be graphic at all, and they truly make up a small portion of the chapter. I really just would rather be safe than sorry, and would hate for anyone to feel uncomfortable, traumatized, triggered, etc from reading this if I didn't post a warning.

As soon as Ginny boarded the Hogwarts Express, she went off in search of an empty compartment. After spending the summer in the crowded Burrow – which had been especially stifling due to her mother’s overbearing protectiveness – she was craving a moment alone. Or at least, as alone as she could be with Tom in her head. 

She nestled in a compartment near the back, praying to Merlin that Tom’s excitement at going back to Hogwarts would settle down enough for them both to get some much needed rest. He was quiet, at least, and seemed content to let her doze without interruption. 

The train lurched to halt, jolting her awake. She glanced out the window, noticing how dark it was, how cold. Tom, who had been keeping to himself for the most part, was on high alert. 

“Tom – “

She hated that she was turning to him for comfort, but the churning in her gut and the dread in her chest left her panicking. 

“Keep your wand out and your head down,” he snapped in her head. She did as he said, tensing as something ominous drifted outside of their compartment, almost stopping before moving on. She let out a breath.

Later, she heard that the dementor – the hellish creature that had only ever been brought up in scary stories during her childhood – had attacked Harry. She couldn’t bring herself to feel anything more than relief that it hadn’t been her.  
-

Hogwarts felt different when she returned, and it wasn’t just the ominous presence of the dementors that dampened the mood. The halls felt smaller to her, and she could still see the faint outlines of words stained in blood on the walls where she had written them last year. She avoided Moaning Myrtle’s bathroom like the plague, much to Tom’s amusement, and every time they were nearby, he’d ask her if she had to use the toilet. 

No one mentioned the Chamber, at least. Sirius Black’s escape from Azkaban was bigger news and Ginny was grateful for the distraction. Remus Lupin was a new addition to the school as well, and she had to admit that he was a far better professor than Lockhart had been.

“That’s not exactly a difficult accomplishment,” Tom said disdainfully. “Lockhart was practically a squib.”

Ginny sighed. “Fine, but I like Professor Lupin. He’s nice.”

“He’s a werewolf,” Tom said. 

“How can you tell?” she asked. It occurred to her belatedly that she had taken Tom’s word as fact, never thinking to second-guess his assumption. 

“How can you not?” was all he said in reply. 

Time drifted onward, and people more or less forgot that Ginny existed. Her own roommates were inclined to leave her alone, no doubt due to her distant demeanor first year. She regretted that she hadn’t been able to form closer friendships – or any friendships, for that matter. She felt horribly alone, even with Tom loitering in her head. 

“You don’t need them, Ginevra,” he told her for the hundredth time as everyone around her paired up for potions, and she was the odd-one-out. “Honestly, they’re beneath you.”

She blew a strand of hair out of her face as she stirred the cauldron, resolutely ignoring him. It was inconvenient that Tom could read her insecurities so clearly, especially when he was the type to use her weaknesses against her.

“Besides,” he said, far too smug, “you have me, and you can’t deny that I’m a better potions partner than any of those buffoons.” 

Ginny grudgingly had to admit that he was right, but only to herself. 

Still, having friends would have been nice. She saw the groups of girls, walking down the halls, arms linked together as they chattered. They probably talked about boys, and shopping, and fashion, and other such things that she would have liked very much to talk about. But her brothers were absolutely not willing to discuss any of those topics, and her mother was too old to be a true confidante, and Tom…well he would think her pathetic to be interested in the first place.

She envied Hermione Granger, even though she tried hard not to. But the other girl – frizzy-haired and buck-toothed Hermione Granger – had two friends she could count on. Two, tangible, breathing friends. 

Ginny didn’t even have one. 

Tom encouraged her to use all of her free time studying, and for the most part, she acquiesced to his demands. She spent hours laboring in the library, and though she might have once found it tedious to spend all day surrounded by nothing but books, she now found peace in the quietness of it all. She was often reading texts that Tom himself had already read, and so he often drifted off during her study sessions, too bored to stay awake. 

It was during times like this when she contemplated how best to kill herself, since Tom wasn’t conscious enough to be aware of her thoughts. She had been very careful to keep them to herself, to make sure he never caught on. But the idea had been lingering, digging its nasty little claws into her mind since she first realized she’d never be rid of him without killing herself as well. 

Some days, she didn’t want to. Some days, he helped her study, taught her spells well beyond her peers’ skill levels. Some days, he complimented her on a potion done well. Some days, Ginny could forget that Tom had tried to kill her, that he would have felt nothing even close to remorse if he had succeeded. 

And then Professor Dumbledore would show up out of the blue, the only professor who still occasionally looked at her with pity or concern, and he’d ask how she was holding up. And then she’d remember everything. She could still smell the blood, still dreamt of chicken necks breaking beneath her own hands. She’d think of Moaning Myrtle, and even though Myrtle’s death wasn’t her fault, Ginny still felt responsible, like her crimes and Tom’s crimes had become one and the same. 

So even though she said she was doing fine, and even though her grades were higher than they’d ever been, and even though she sometimes thought she could deal with a lifetime of Tom Riddle in her head, there were still some days – far too many days – when she figured she could climb on her brother’s broom, fly it as high as possible, and then just slip off. Flying sounded nice, she thought. Or maybe she’d wander into the forbidden forest at night. Or maybe she’d walk into the black lake, and never let herself resurface. Or maybe she’d let one of Hagrid’s dangerous pets have a go at her.

The last one, as it turned out, was not quite as out-of-the-question as she had initially labeled it. After Malfoy’s incident with the hippogriff – which everyone, including Malfoy’s father, knew about within the hour – Ginny got to thinking that she could perhaps slip down to where the beast was kept while Tom took his afternoon snooze, and just be done with it. It would be quite a way to go. 

Tom stopped her before she had even made it out of the castle.

“Just where do you think you’re going?” he asked. It surprised her still that a non-physical voice could sound groggy, yet Tom’s voice often did when he first ‘woke up’. 

“To see –“

“The hippogriff,” Tom finished for her, his voice deadly calm. “I hope you weren’t going to do what I think you were going to do.”

She leaned heavily against the wall. 

“Of course not,” she lied. “I just wanted a closer look.”

He only hummed in response.

Tom stopped taking afternoon naps.

-

Sirius Black had tried to break into the Gryffindor common room, and Ginny couldn’t find it in her to be scared.

“The Blacks are mad,” Tom had said in warning. “The whole lot of them. You’ll have to be careful.”

Ginny spat out her toothpaste into the sink, rinsing away the red-tinged foam. She probably shouldn’t have scrubbed so hard, she told herself, but at least the soft aching in her gums was satisfying. 

“Let him attack,” she responded. “I don’t care.”

Tom sighed. “Honestly, Ginevra. You could at least try to pretend -”

She took a deep breath and blocked him out; it was getting easier to ignore him sometimes.

-

Tom was impressed, albeit reluctantly. 

Ginevra Weasley, a twelve-year-old girl with no extraordinary power, had effectively managed to shield her mind from him. It was shaky occlumency, clearly self-taught and not exactly intentional, but it was impressive magic for a kid all the same. 

It certainly gave him something to consider. She clearly had the capability to learn complex magic, and could perhaps even be motivated to do so. She just needed a teacher, and though he had been tutoring her when it suited him to do so, he wondered just how much she could accomplish if he actually decided to give a shit. 

Besides, he theorized that his continued influence on her would go one of two ways: she would either eventually become so overwhelmed with the helplessness of her situation that she actually would kill herself, thus killing Tom as well, or she would turn to his side. He preferred the latter, obviously, and believed that taking it upon himself to become her mentor would increase the chances of his desired outcome. 

Yes, he would cultivate her. It wasn’t quite as good as having full control over his own body, but it would do for now.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A continuation of Ginny's 2nd year at Hogwarts.

It happened in early April. It was dark still in Ginny’s room in Gryffindor tower, her dorm mates fast asleep in the early Saturday morning. The sun was hours from rising, yet Ginny Weasley and Tom Riddle were both wide awake, and grateful for the heavy silencing charms Ginny had slept with ever since her brother’s had complained about the screams from her night terrors.

 

“It feels as though you’re making a horcrux,” Tom complained through gritted teeth, feeling Ginevra’s pain as his own. She was writhing unpleasantly in the sheets, trying to find some position that would lessen the horrid cramping in her abdomen. Tom thought his analogy was not quite honest – the feeling of having one’s soul forcibly ripped from the body was a unique, searing agony in the chest. This…this hell that Ginevra was putting him through, well…it was more like someone was taking a dull knife to his insides and sawing away for hours and hours and hours.

 

If he had to go through this every single month, Tom was going to let Ginevra kill herself. Anything, he thought, had to be better than this.

 

For her own part, Ginevra felt as though she’d been terribly betrayed.

 

“You lied to me,” she hissed at him, biting back tears as a particularly bad spasm tore through her. “When you told me about periods, you didn’t mention this.”

 

“You’ll have to forgive the gaps in my knowledge,” he snapped. “As I’m sure you can imagine, I’ve never been privy to the specific pains of having a uterus.”

 

She groaned and rolled so that her knees were tucked under her stomach and her head pressed firmly into a pillow. She’d go to Madame Pomfrey to get painkillers. Later, though. When she could stand without feeling the need to vomit.

 

* * *

 

Buckbeak was sentenced to death, and all of Slytherin was gloating. Most of the Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs were outraged, as far as Ginny could tell, but she couldn’t summon up the energy to care. She didn’t have an opinion on Buckbeak’s life, although she’d had to pretend she did for the sake of fitting in among her house. As per usual, Tom did, in fact, have an opinion.

 

“This is really just further proof of the incompetence in Hogwarts and the Ministry,” Tom said in his usual way. “If that oaf Hagrid hadn’t been allowed to teach—“

 

“Or if that twat Draco hadn’t been allowed to be born,” Ginny interjected. Tom snorted in amusement. Interrupting him was always a risk, but Ginny was starting to find that he was more open to it if her interruptions were in agreement with his own thoughts. Draco was one thing they could certainly agree on.

 

“I’ll never understand how Abraxas could have spawned such an incompetent, careless, disappointment of a grandson,” he sneered. “That boy is a disgrace to Slytherin.”

 

“Has it occurred to you that you might only think that because you are, at present, occupying the form of a Gryffindor, and therefore are not receiving preferential treatment?”

 

Tom huffed. “Ginevra, you are no more a Gryffindor than I am. The Malfoy heir is tactless and a simpering kiss-ass. He’s not fit for our house.”   


“I’m no Slytherin, Riddle.” She only called him that when she was trying too hard to defy him, and he knew it.

 

“Not yet,” he acquiesced. “But you will be.”

 

* * *

 

The dark forest used to scare her. Even looking at it from a distance had been enough to send a chill down her spine. But as April turned to May and Ginny learned that Harry was getting special lessons from Professor Lupin, she stopped refusing Tom’s offers to tutor her in the forest. If she was going to be strong, she needed the practice. Even if they ran the risk of running into dementors out there.

 

“I don’t know why you idolize him so much,” Tom stated coolly, having read her thoughts yet again. “Potter is a child of no significant magical ability, yet you worship him.”

 

“He saved me,” she said as she ducked under the low-hanging pine branches. She could feel Tom rolling his eyes.

 

“I saved you, you insipid girl.”

 

Ginny grit her teeth. Tom was, as per usual, not wrong. He’d done the soul-binding ritual before Harry had arrived, had secured their connection to each other long before Harry had killed the basilisk and stabbed the diary.

 

“You also tried to kill me,” she pointed out, remembering his cold, ghostly hand around her throat, the ceremonial knife in his hand. “And we both know you weren’t saving me; you were saving yourself.”

 

“Semantics.” They were deep within the forest now, hidden from prying eyes and the overbearing magical wards of Hogwarts. “That tree,” he said, pointing to a broad oak several yards in front of them, “will be your target.”

 

“What spell are we learning?” she asked.

 

“The Reductor Curse,” Tom said.

 

“But that’s a fifth-year spell.”

 

Tom snorted. “Only because it’s destructive. Hence, why we are practicing out here and not in a spare room in the castle.”

 

“But-“

 

“It’s simple, Ginevra, especially for a witch of your abilities.”

 

Even as he spoke, she knew he was lying. Tom Riddle was a flatterer, and on top of that, he had lived in Ginny’s head for long enough to know that praise of any sort was sorely missing from her life. She knew – for she was a clever girl and not nearly as stupid as Tom always seemed to think – that he was lying to her now, that he did not think her a particularly capable witch. And yet she could not think of a good reason for him to teach her at all.

 

“Oh Ginevra, would you please quit thinking quite so loudly,” he droned, hints of irritation undermining the otherwise bored tone of his voice. “Perhaps you are not a capable witch yet, but I will make you into one. There. Does that soothe your worries?”

 

She did not respond, but instead focused on blocking him out as much as she could, something she knew he did not appreciate. She had read about the Reductor Curse, of course, but she wished she could see it in action. Almost instantly, a memory surfaced at the front of her mind, not one of her own, but Tom’s. He was standing in a classroom at Hogwarts, some older woman behind the desk where Professor Lupin currently sat. There was a target dummy in front of him, and with a single, angled flick of his wand, and the softly murmured, “Reducto,” a spark of blue-ish white light sprung forth from his wand and the dummy burst into ash.

 

She emerged from the memory and focused on the tree in front of her. Tom had made it look so easy – everything seemed effortless for him – and she knew that it would not be so for her. She adjusted the grip on her wand and took a stance that had been similar to his from the memory. Imitating him to the best of her ability, she lazily flicked her wand, shouting, “Reducto,” as she let loose a fiery resentment that had been bottled up inside her. The curse, not nearly as strong as Tom’s had been in the memory, struck the tree trunk dead center, and half of it exploded into dust.

 

“Not bad for a first try,” Tom’s voice said, sounding almost grudgingly pleased. “Now do it again, this time with the knowledge that you have already succeeded.”

 

She stayed in the forest until it was nearly sunset, exploding trees and bushed and rocks until nothing but dust was left.

 

* * *

 

The first of June rolled around and Ginny thought she might actually be doing, well, not okay, but close enough. It had been just over a year since the incident in the Chamber, and it seemed that no one had thought about it in months. May 29th had come and gone, and not one person had thought to ask Ginny how she was doing. It suited her just fine. She was growing accustomed to Tom’s presence, and she did not want to think about him as the boy who had tried and failed to murder her. She couldn’t live with herself if she thought of her cohabitation with Tom as somehow forgiving him for what he’d done. She didn’t. She just…

 

She was old enough to realize that the boy in the Chamber and the boy in her head were different. She had grown and changed in a year. Tom could too.

 

That didn’t mean things were easier for her, though. She was still an outcast, still too shy and quiet and in her own head (or Tom’s) to befriend anyone. She spent a fair few of her evenings in the Gryffindor common room, fading quietly into the background while hoping that somehow, someone might notice that she existed. Tom told her, on several occasions, that this was quite pathetic.

 

“If you want people to notice you, Ginevra, you have to make them notice,” he’d said, and she was starting to think he was right. She was currently curled up in an armchair in the corner of the common room, and had been for at least an hour, when her brother, Ron, and none other than Harry Potter came in, seemingly completely unaware of her presence.

 

“But Dumbledore says Ginny doesn’t think Riddle’s dead,” Harry was saying, and these words caught both Ginny and Tom’s attention. Still, she didn’t move for fear that they might see her and stop talking.

 

Ron scoffed, nose wrinkling in derision. “Come on. You killed the dirty, lying bastard in the chamber,” he said earnestly. “Besides, you know Gin. She’s probably just trying to get attention.”

 

Ginny didn’t hear Harry’s response as both of the boys were leaving to go up to their room. She waited until she heard the door shut before rising and marching out of the common room. She was only vaguely aware that Tom was trying to talk to her, but she wasn’t paying attention. Her feet moved of their own accord, her mind not completely aware of where she was going. Barely conscious of her own actions, she unlocked the school’s broom cupboard and stole a broom. She left the castle under the guise of a strong disillusionment charm she learned from Tom and through a hidden passage she’d seen Fred and George use during her first year at Hogwarts.

 

Once outside, she kicked off, ignoring both the stinging rain and Tom’s protests. He’d been able to stop her recklessness before because she was still afraid of him and afraid of the power he’d always had over her. But now, she was beyond his reach.

 

She hadn’t been on a broom in months, partly out of respect for her mother’s wishes and partly because Tom wouldn’t let her get near one out of fear she’d follow through on her ideas of suicide. She relished in the rush of the wind in her face now, how the rain pelted her skin raw and the swooping of the broom briefly made her forget her brother’s careless cruelty. The worst of it was that she knew he hadn’t meant anything mean by it, and she knew that he wouldn’t have said that at all if he’d known she was sitting less than 30 feet away from him at the time. But he thought it true, at the very least, and that was awful enough.

 

She had forgotten, though, about one thing in her hurry to get out of the castle and fly. Dementors. Her skin prickled as they neared, and though she couldn’t see them, she knew they were getting closer. The panic flooded through her chest, erasing every other emotion. Even Tom was silent. She dove to land, to rush back inside the castle to safety, but her grip on the broom slipped due to the slickness of the rain and the speed with which she descended.

 

She fell.

 

The thing Ginevra Weasley learned about falling – something she had never thought to consider before – is that it knocks the breath out of you. It steals away logical thought and replaces it with pure terror. There was clarity in her mind, yes, but not for anything useful. Instead, she thought that no matter how much one might think they want to die, this was not the way to go about it. And that was it. She could not think beyond the moment.

 

Luckily Tom did not have such limitations. The moment her grip had faltered, he began pooling Ginevra’s magic with his own, and in a show of pure magical strength, stopped their fall a mere three inches from the ground. Maybe it was the fact that she was magically exhausted, or maybe it was because she knew she didn’t have the strength to run back to the castle on her own, but something that had never before happened between their minds since the incident in the Chamber happened now. Ginny’s mind seemed to slide to the back, conscious but willingly allowing Tom’s more active mind to take primary control.

 

Endless weeks of trying to gain control of Ginevra’s body had proved utterly futile, but now, like the flip of a switch, her consciousness stepped aside. If Tom had thought being a back-seat passenger to Ginevra’s body had been physically and emotionally taxing, it was nothing compared to the way he felt now. In comparison, everything he’d been feeling before was a like a second-hand experience. The world was tangible to him now.

 

He didn’t have time to enjoy it, however, because the presence of the dementors was growing nearer. His own emotions were far more in check that Ginevra’s had been, and so the pull wouldn’t be as strong, surely, but Tom still had no desire to encounter a dementor when he wasn’t one-hundred-percent positive he had the upper hand.

 

He sprinted them as fast as a 12-year-old girl’s legs would allow, back through a different entrance in Hogwarts, one that yielded to him only because of the hissing command he spoke into the stone wall. The stones slid aside, revealing a staircase leading downward towards the Chamber of Secrets. Only when the wall slid close behind him did he breathe.

 

And he was promptly ejected from his place at the forefront of Ginevra’s head, her consciousness once again taking over.

 

“We’re in the Chamber,” she said, voice wavering unintentionally. “Get us out, Tom. I won’t be here a moment longer than necessary.”

 

“You careless, stupid girl,” he said, the anger of having his freedom once again taken away combining with his rage at almost being killed. “You could have killed us both.”

 

Ginny remained calm, cool. Almost as if she was channeling him. “I know.”

 

“We’re soul-bound, Ginevra. Do you have any idea what that means?” His voice was low, angry and threatening.

 

“I die, you die,” she said. “Simple.”

 

“Not. Simple. We die, we’re stuck together,” Tom explained. “Forever. Even in death, I would be trapped with you. I think you want that about as much as I do.”

 

She was quiet for a moment, shivering because of the rain, and the cold, and the nerves.

 

“You will guide me out of the Chamber, Tom,” she said, finally. “Or I will throw myself down these stairs.”

 

“You would risk an eternity of me in your head?” he sneered disbelievingly.

 

Ginny’s lips curled. “It’s more a punishment for you than me. I tolerate you because you are here. In life or in death, it does not change things. But you.” She paused, her smile taking on a cruel edge. “You only put up with me because you believe in the chance of regaining your body. That chance goes away if we die. I have you figured out, Tom. You can’t lie to me.”

 

If she hadn’t been using her own cleverness against him, he would have been proud at how far she’d come since that scared little girl in the Chamber a year ago. Not far enough, though.

 

“And you can’t lie to me, Ginevra,” Tom said, matching her tone. “You don’t want to die.” He felt her body tense. “No, you don’t want to die at all.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It has been almost a whole year since I've updated this fic and I'm so sorry for that. There's really no reason other than I completely forgot about it. I have some vague outlines for at least four more chapters, so hopefully I'll be inspired to update soon. 
> 
> As always, please feel free to comment. I love hearing from everyone, and comments/kudos let me know you actually want to read more of this story. 
> 
> Thank you. Much love <3


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The summer before Ginny's 3rd year, including Quidditch Cup drama.

Tom never liked Quidditch. Despite the flying brooms and the anthropomorphic snitch, there was something about the sport that was altogether too muggle for his liking. Not to mention, the only broom he’d ever been on in his own time had been such an outdated wreck that it barely got four feet off the ground. He had no intention of zipping around on anything that shuddered under his weight before he’d even kicked off.

 

But Ginny loved Quidditch. She loved it quite a bit more than she loved anything else in her life, and so there was nothing Tom or anyone else could do to keep her from a broom. Even Molly had been persuaded that a little bit of fresh air would do her daughter some good. Plus, with as many of them as there were, they could set up a rudimentary game.

 

“You could start a family team,” Tom had mocked once. “Seven children, seven players.”

 

“Hardly,” Ginny had said in return, rolling her eyes. “Imagine Percy on a broom. Now, whatever you’ve pictured, the reality is at least ten times worse.”

 

She spent most of her summer in the air, much to Tom’s discomfort. It had taken her a whole week to realize that Tom wasn’t just afraid of her intentionally killing herself, he was merely terrified of flying in general. Ginny had noted his fear, and was taking great pleasure from it. She executed spins and spirals, flips and balancing tricks. She was always a good flier, but now that she was pushing her limits – and Tom’s – she was truly magnificent.

 

Harry, when he came to visit the week before the Quidditch World Cup, noticed. They had played a quick match after breakfast: Harry and Ron against Fred, George, and Ginny. Ron was still upset about losing three hours later.

 

“It wasn’t fair. Three against two,” Ron whined, head thrown back on the living room couch. He pointed accusingly at his two brothers. “Not to mention, you’ve both been playing on the Gryffindor team for years. You had the advantage.”

 

“That’s funny, isn’t it Fred?” George said, feigning confusion. “Did you catch the snitch?”

 

His counterpart frowned, as if deep in thought. “I don’t remember catching the snitch. Do you?”

 

“No, I don’t think I did.” George grinned at his younger brother. “Face it Ron, Gin was just a hair faster than your good ol’ champion seeker.”

 

Ron pouted. “She was just lucky. Harry’s got to be the best seeker in a century.”

 

“Not today,” the messy-haired boy said with a grin as he plopped down next Ron on the couch. He feigned despair. “My career is dead in the water, it seems. Wood will be crushed when I tell him I’ve given up Quidditch.”

 

“He’ll live once he sees Ginny fly,” Fred teased. Then, he grew thoughtful and turned to face Ginny. “We could do with a new chaser, though.”

 

Tom scowled at her. “No. Absolutely not.” He’d already spent more time on a broom these past few weeks than he wanted to for the rest of his life.

 

She shoved him aside and shrugged. “I’ll try out.”

 

 

* * *

 

 

Viktor Krum caught the snitch, but Ireland still won. It was a shock for everyone, even Tom.

 

“Bad tactics,” he said afterwards in that know-it-all voice he used when talking about anyone other than himself. “Why catch the snitch and end the game when you’re that far behind in points? Absolutely ridiculous. That Viktor Krum is an idiot. I’d put money on it.”

 

“I though you said you didn’t care about this ‘stupid, bloody game’?” Ginny asked, smirking.

 

“I don’t,” he said a little too snappishly. “I just don’t see how anyone could be that incompetent.”

 

“Mm-hmm.”

 

“Ginevra, I do not care about Quidditch.”

 

“You know, for something you don’t care about at all, you sure talk about it a lot,” she pointed out. “Who’d have ever though Lord Voldemort was a windbag?”

 

“Be quiet,” he said, voice suddenly cold.

 

But Ginny was used to his moods. “Sheesh. You could stand to lighten up a little Tom. You’ve got a real stick up your arse –“

 

“I said to be quiet, you useless girl,” he snarled at her. It was vicious enough to stun her into silence. He hadn’t been that angry with since she’d almost damned them to eternal cohabitation during her stunt with the broom at the end of her second year. She would have been lying if she’d claimed it didn’t sting.

 

“We need to leave,” he said suddenly, breaking off her train of thought. He was no less tense than a moment ago, but the anger was gone.

 

“Tom –“

 

“Something’s wrong,” he said. “There’s dark magic here. We should go.”

 

She balked. “Your followers?” She could feel him roll his eyes.

 

“I last saw my followers in 1943, Ginevra. Even if they’re on my side, these wizards follow the orders of my older self, not me.” He paused, deep in thought. “And you said my older self had perished.”

 

“He did. Twice now, actually.”

 

Tom ignored the jab. “Give me control, Ginevra, and I will apparate us to safety.”

 

“No.” Her tone left no room for argument.

 

“Do you not realize how completely fucked we are? They will kill us unless we leave.” Tom was pulling as hard as he could at her consciousness as if he could force her to relinquish control of her body, of her magic. It did not seem to matter that this had never worked for him before.

 

“My family is here, Tom.” She had already started moving towards the tent where she knew her parents would be. “I can’t leave them.”

 

“You don’t need them,” he snapped.

 

It was an argument he’d been pushing from the very beginning, and it had become easy to drown out. She didn’t know much about his past, but she suspected Tom had never had a family if his general disdain towards the concept of familial bonds was anything to go by. If he were anyone else, she might have felt sorry for him.

 

She was close to the tent when she finally heard the screams, but by then, there were so many people rushing through the paths that she couldn’t stop or else she’d be run over. She was pushed, shoved, prodded. There were unfamiliar hands clawing at her shoulders, elbows jabbing her sides. She couldn’t see anything other than the backs of unfamiliar wizards and witches.

 

Someone from behind knocked her to the ground, but the stampeded around her didn’t let up. Ginny curled in on herself while the crowd rushed past, hundreds of feet stomping dangerously close to her head.

 

As suddenly as it started, it all came to a horrifyingly silent stop. Ginny untucked her head and hauled herself to her feet, dusting her hands off on her clothes. There were still a few tents standing, but the once crowded area was now entirely empty. The sky was darker now too, and for a moment she wondered if she’d fallen unconscious.

 

“You haven’t,” Tom supplied. “It’s only smoke.” He paused for a moment. “Ginevra, we need to move. Now.”

 

“My family—“

 

“Will be looking for you,” Tom said, and if she had been paying attention, she might have noticed the bitterness in his voice. “We need to get to safety—“

 

Ginny wasn’t sure what happened first: if she saw the flash of red before she rolled to the ground, or if she’d felt the tingle of magic in the air first, if she’d ducked before she was even consciously aware of the threat. It didn’t matter. Her body moved of its own accord, or maybe it moved to Tom’s will. She dropped to the ground and rolled, avoiding a bright red jet of light by little more than a hair. Playing so much quidditch over the summer served her well; she was back on her feet in a split second, wand at the ready.

 

A tall figure in a dark cloak walked out from behind a nearby tent, their face hidden behind a deatheater’s mask. Ginny had never seen one in person, but she knew. And she should have been terrified.

 

She just wasn’t.

 

“I let them dress like that? In those masks?” Tom asked, the disbelief and distaste evident in his voice. “Merlin. No wonder nobody wanted to be on my side.”

 

Ginevra snorted. Who could she possibly fear when the dark lord himself lived in her head, cracking jokes no less?

 

“We’ll see who’s laughing when I curse you, girl,” the deatheater said in a distinctly masculine voice. He stepped closer.

 

“Are you sure you have good enough aim to hit me?” she drawled, twirling her wand the way she’d seen Tom do in his memories of dueling. She thought it made him look bored, powerful, but on a petite, thirteen year-old girl, it must have looked laughably bizarre. At the very least, the deatheater wasn’t taking her seriously.

 

“What fire,” he laughed. “Pity you had to be a bloodtraitor, Weasley.”

 

Ginny stiffened, panic sliding through her veins like ice.

 

“He knows you, Ginevra,” Tom’s cool voice said, his very presence soothing her nerves. She didn’t have time to think about how wrong that was. “And he’s throwing around unforgiveables like they’re presents on Christmas morning. Give me control, and I’ll—“

 

“There’s no need for the lecture, Tom. I know what needs to be done,” she said, her voice steely. She thought about her family, how they would never be safe if deatheaters were targeting them. She thought about mercy, and how it was for people who didn’t have anything to lose. She thought about herself – about Tom – and how neither of them wanted to die, not really. About how neither of them were in a position to be merciful.

 

Ginevra was not the duelist that Tom was. He had years of practice, an unmatched repertoire of light and dark spells, hexes, and curses, and unsurpassable natural talent. He was a prodigy. She was a thirteen year-old girl with a handful of lessons from a budding dark lord under her belt, and no actual dueling experience.

 

The deatheater was faster. Before Ginny could even began to cast, he had already sent another cruicatus her way. She rolled again, but not quick enough. The spell clipped her shoulder and she cried out. It was agony. Every inch of her body was on fire, and it seemed endless. How long had it been? A minute? Five? It could have been seconds or hours.

 

Finally, the spell let up, and the deatheater stood over her, no part of his face visible except for his dark eyes and the sharp curl of his lips. White, sharp teeth gleamed from behind his lips. He knelt on the ground beside her, a large, rough hand on her cheek.

 

“I wonder what that family of yours is gonna do when they find your body here,” he whispered.

 

“Ginevra,” Tom’s voice was urgent, panicked. The redhead wasn’t moving, just shaking uncontrollably – a side effect of the cruciatus. “Ginevra, do something. Do something!”

 

“Their little girl,” the deatheater said. “They won’t know it was me. Not at first. But when the Dark Lord returns, when we no longer have to hide in the shadows, that’ll be the first thing I do. Right before I kill the rest of your pathetic, disgusting family.”

 

Ginny’s body shook harder, and then a laugh burst from her lips, high and cold, and reminiscent enough of Tom’s – no, of Voldemort’s laugh that the deatheater leaned back for a second.

 

“And I wonder,” Ginny said, her voice rasping up her raw throat, “just how quickly you’ll be forgotten.”

 

Before the man could open his mouth, Ginny’s wand was pressed under his chin, the word already half out of her mouth.

 

“Reducto.”

 

As the man’s head – mask and all – burst into a cloud of bone dust and blood, Tom made a mental note to teach Ginevra cleaner ways of killing people. And then he felt her mind slide towards the back as he was pushed forward. He wasn’t surprised, really. Ginevra wasn’t a born killer.

 

But if today was any proof, he could teach her.

 

 

* * *

 

 

Tom cleaned her up with a quick “evanesco”, vanishing all the blood and brain matter with a quick flick of her wand. And then he put on his best “Ginny” face and hurried to find the rest of the Weasley herd. Not that it was hard to find half a dozen obnoxiously loud redheads.

 

Tom ambled towards them, trying to look shaken and panicked and relieved all at once, although it didn’t take much effort to channel Ginny’s feelings. He’d spent enough time in her head to know what each felt like, what each emotion looked like on her.

 

Mrs. Weasley pulled Ginny’s body into a bone-crushing hug and Tom forced himself to lean into it. Apparently Potter had gotten himself involved in the middle of everything yet again, and had almost been accused of lighting the sky up with the dark mark. Because that apparently seemed plausible.

 

Everyone was too caught up in Potter’s drama to even question where Ginny had been or what she had been up to or why she didn’t seem to have so much as a speck of dust on her. Which suited Tom just fine.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey yo demons, it's ya boi! I am back at it again, hopefully more consistently this time (although I feel like I always say that). That being said, prepare for more updates sooooon-ish because I am on a roll with both this story and Power Vacuum Conundrum. 
> 
> As always, much love to everyone who continues to read. I love you guys. Thank you for your continued support.   
> Please feel free to kudos, comment, etc. I love hearing from you all (and it often reminds me that there are people out there who want to read what I write) <3


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ginny starts her 3rd year featuring Neville and Luna. Tom is almost as much of a dick as before. And then there's a dream.

Ginny was quiet on the train to Hogwarts. She had been quiet, really, since the World Cup, first because Tom was really the one in control – and what a disturbingly good job he’d done at being her, she thought. But even after she’d regained control of her own mind and body again, she couldn’t stop thinking about the fact that she’d killed a man. Not just any man, but a fully grown dark wizard.

 

“Pity there was no way to tell who it was,” Tom said for the seventeenth time in the past two weeks, although his voice was held just an edge of sadistic glee. “You know, since you blew his head off.”

 

Ginny didn’t particularly want to think about it. She didn’t regret killing him seeing as he had tried to kill her first. It was self-defense, she tried to tell herself, but Tom always snorted every time she pulled that argument. Even she knew it was weak. She’d known she would kill him the moment he mentioned her family name. It hadn’t even occurred to her to try to simply disarm the man.

 

And this bothered her. It bothered her more that she didn’t regret it because she felt that she should have. She thought she was supposed to feel a crippling remorse, or at least some sort of horror at the manner in which the man had died. Ginny had, of course, been disgusted by the blood and brain matter in her hair, but only because it was messy.

 

At least nobody had wanted to talk to her about what happened during the World Cup. In fact, they seemed to avoid speaking about it in her presence at all. Her parents had apparently deemed her “too young” to be exposed to the implications of the sudden resurgence of Death Eater activity. She and Tom had sneered in unison at that. As if anyone else – except for Harry Potter – had been through even a fraction of what Ginny had. As if Ginny was just some innocent child when she had in fact not only met Lord Voldemort, but was essentially living with him.

 

Now that she was headed back to Hogwarts, she found that she was entirely unwilling to participate in the nervous, speculative chatter of her classmates. She did not care whether they thought the Death Eaters were acting on their own or if they thought Voldemort was back. Tom, who might have normally pushed her to collect as much information as possible, agreed for once that her classmates were almost certainly ignorant to the true happenings of the Dark Lord. He apparently had no patience for their drivel either.

 

Instead, she sat in a quiet compartment with Neville Longbottom – who Ginny had always known to be an unobtrusive person – and a strange Ravenclaw named Luna Lovegood. Neither of her companions were really the chatty type, aside from a brief moment when Luna had squinted at Ginny for nearly five minutes straight and then calmly informed the redhead that she should really do something about the wrackspurts around her head.

 

“What the fuck is a wrackspurt?” Tom asked, but Ginny could provide no answer. She did notice, however, that Tom had become slightly more accustomed to cursing. Whether this was from prolonged exposure to Ron and the twins, or because he felt no need to keep up his “charming Head Boy” charade in her head anymore, she wasn’t sure.

 

“Oh, thank you, Luna,” Ginny said instead, choosing to appease the blonde girl. “I hadn’t noticed them.”

 

Luna hummed. “Most people can’t see them, I suppose,” she said dreamily, and then went back to reading her bizarre magazine.

 

“Utterly barmy,” Tom decided, his voice tainted with disgust, but Ginny decided she rather liked Luna’s unnatural calmness. And perhaps she liked that Tom was irritated by the blonde, too.

 

* * *

 

 

Ginny almost screeched when she saw the dark, skeletal horses pulling each of the carriages up to the school, but Tom’s stern, calm voice stopped her.

 

“They are thestrals,” he explained. “You can see them because you have known death. Best keep this to yourself. Everyone will want to know why you can see them.”

 

Ginny climbed into the carriages and pretended to ignore them. “If it comes up, I’ll just tell them it was because of what happened in the Chamber,” she said to him.

 

Suddenly, Ginny felt a small surge of incredulity and something that felt weirdly similar to pride coming from Tom’s end of their connection.

 

“I suppose that would work,” he said, his voice as indifferent as ever. But Ginny felt the warm tingle of his lingering emotions long after he fell silent.

 

* * *

 

 

When Dumbledore announced that their new Defense Against the Dark Arts professor was none other than Alastor Moody, gasps echoed throughout the Great Hall. Even Ginny was in awe, and Tom – very much disgruntled – had to admit that he didn’t know anything about the man.

 

“Oh?” Ginny said with faux surprised. “You mean there is something the great Tom Riddle doesn’t know?”

 

He snarled at her. “He’s a bit after my time, in case you didn’t notice.”

 

Ginny smirked. “Old man.”

 

But when Moody himself walked through the door with a peg leg and an ever-twitching magical eye, Ginny could feel Tom’s confusion escalate further.

 

“He reeks of dark magic,” Tom said when Ginny asked him what was wrong. She could practically feel him frowning.

 

“Well, he is famous for catching dark wizards,” Ginny supplied, but now she was curious. She couldn’t imagine Dumbledore bringing in a teacher who was actually dark, but then again…

“Quirrel,” both Tom and Ginny said at the same time, remembering how they’d heard about Harry and Ron’s disastrous first year where Voldemort had infiltrated the castle by riding on the back of a man’s head.

 

“We’ll have to keep an eye on Moody,” Tom said, even as Dumbledore moved on to discuss the Tri-Wizard tournament.

 

Ginny hummed in agreement. Tom might have been paranoid, but when he suspected something was off, he was usually right.

 

* * *

 

 

Tom was – weirdly – more excited about the arrival of the Durmstrang and Beauxbatons students than Ginny was. Not that Ginny wasn’t thrilled. In fact, she’d even willingly gossiped with Luna and Neville about what these other schools might be like, enough so that she was surprising everyone with her sudden bout of sociability. But Tom…Tom was thrumming with energy.

 

“Durmstrang students openly practice dark magic,” he told Ginny, barely able to keep his voice level. “They actually teach it there, and it isn’t discriminated against. Not like here. And Beauxbatons actually is a bit more neutral from what I’ve heard, but their upper-level classes offered some dark arts training. Or at least, they did back in the 1940s.”

 

“Good for them,” Ginny said dryly. She felt Tom rolling his eyes.

 

“Oh sweet, innocent Ginevra,” he drawled sarcastically. She was neither of those things and they both knew it. “Think for a minute. They’re coming to Hogwarts. Do you know what that means?”

 

She frowned, not quite able to put together what he was telling her.

 

“Dumbledore can’t ban them from using dark magic without being accused of giving his own school an advantage in the tournament,” he said, too gleeful to be irritated by having to spell it out for her. “And the wards can’t tell who’s casting dark magic, only that it’s being cast.”

 

“You want me to practice the dark arts,” she said slowly, eyes narrowing.

 

Tom huffed. “You already blew a man’s head off, Ginevra. Do get off your moral high horse.”

 

She supposed that was fair. At thirteen, she’d already killed a man _on purpose_. And rather brutally too, as Tom liked to remind her. But still, the dark arts…

 

“I’ll teach you,” Tom offered, his voice low and soft. Ginny nearly rolled her eyes. His voice was only ever like that when he wanted something, and for a moment she considered refusing just to be spiteful. Just to prove he couldn’t manipulate her the way he had back in her first year.

 

But….

 

But she’d be a fool to pass up this opportunity. Such a perfect alignment of factors would likely never occur again. Ginny wet her lips. Dark didn’t mean evil, necessarily, and Tom _was_ a great teacher.

 

“Okay then. When do we start?”

 

* * *

 

 

Ginny had to admit that upon seeing the Beauxbatons and Durmstrang students, her excitement dimmed. They were all older students – at least seventeen, since that was the age requirement for the tournament – and aside from the famous Viktor Krum, none of them stood out. Tom, who admitted to having a sensitivity towards magic – and dark magic in particular – was utterly euphoric when the Durmstrang students entered the hall.

 

“If you could feel it, Ginevra,” he said, and his voice was almost breathy, “you would understand.”

 

“Show me,” she said. Lately, she had been able to feel stronger echoes of his own emotions, and even could sense what his mannerisms would be like if he had a body. Sometimes she thought that it was merely because she knew Tom so well, but other times, she wondered if their connection was growing. It didn’t concern her nearly as much as it ought to have.

 

Realizing where she was going with this, Tom pushed forward what he was sensing into her consciousness. He had felt her pain before, but Ginny had never felt anything that he, as Tom the soul-piece, was capable of feeling. Ginny nearly gasped at the feeling. It was not quite emotion, not one of Tom’s thoughts or a vague feeling of contentment. It was like a flood of energy coursing straight through her body, and it left her feeling lightheaded and fuzzy all over even as Tom pulled back. She could feel him observing her.

 

“That’s what dark magic feels like to you,” she said in wonder, though it wasn’t a question. Even in her own head, she was a little breathless, and Tom’s smug satisfaction echoed through her brain.

 

“It will feel like that for you, too, when we practice it,” he said, pushing forward just a brief pulse of the energy again. Ginny bit her lip savagely to keep another gasp from coming out, tearing the skin just enough to draw a drop of blood. Tom chuckled in her head.

 

“Ginny, are you alright?”

 

She looked over at Neville, who was sitting directly across from her. His brown eyes were warm with concern, brow furrowed. She quickly swiped her tongue over her bottom lip to rid it of blood, and gave him a weak smile.

 

“Yeah, it’s just…,” she broke off and glanced around as if afraid of being overhead. She leaned in a bit and Neville did as well, eager for what she had to say. “The Durmstrang Headmaster, Igor Karkaroff. I think Dad said he used to be a Death Eater.”

 

Neville’s eyes went comically wide. “Oh.”

 

Ginny consoled her moral conscience by reminding herself that she wasn’t lying to Neville – her dad did mention once that Karkaroff was a Death Eater once – it just wasn’t exactly what was bothering her. Tom, who was still taking a great deal of amusement out of Ginny’s reactions, sent one last burst of feeling her way, laughing as she dug her fingernails into her thighs to keep from visibly reacting in front of her housemates.

 

Still, Neville seemed to notice her wince. She gave him another smile once Tom finally let up.

 

“I’m sure it’s nothing,” she said soothingly, a cover for her near-breathlessness. “Dumbledore would never let an active Death Eater into the castle.”

 

Now that was probably a lie, especially considering he had let Voldemort himself in on more than one occasion, and in fact, the young Dark Lord was sitting at the Gryffindor table at the very moment, albeit inside Ginny’s head. But Neville seemed comforted by this lie, and Ginny almost sneered at his blind faith in Dumbledore. It was hard not to resent the man who had inadvertently allowed her to be possessed by Tom.

 

“My, my,” Tom drawled as Neville resumed eating, leaving Ginny alone in her thoughts with Tom again. “Someone has become quite the little liar.”

 

His words were mocking, but his amusement was clear in his tone. And his emotions, Ginny noticed, filtered through into her consciousness very clearly. He was pleased with her. Very much so.

 

For a brief second, she felt her own pride swell at his unvoiced praise before she stamped it down and tried her best to block him out entirely. He was still Tom, she reminded herself. Still dangerous. Still manipulative. She refused to be his victim again.

 

* * *

 

 

Ginny stood in a dark hallway, old wood boards creaking beneath her feet. A loud hiss to her left caused her to jump, and a huge snake slithered by, its scaly body dragging across the floor. She cringed. Ever since the incident with the basilisk, she hadn’t been too keen on snakes. Tom originally found great amusement in that, but it was soon tiring, and he’d been trying to cure her of what he called “an irrational fear.”

 

Taking a deep breath, she followed the snake at a distance, making sure to never get too close in case it decided to strike. The hallway was unfamiliar, but she recognized that it must be some kind of house. Not a very nice one, she noted, and considering that her frame of reference was the Burrow, that was saying something.

 

At the end of the hallway, a door was slightly cracked open, a faint yellow glow and a hushed murmuring indicating that someone was inside. Two someones, actually. The snake stopped at the door, almost as if it was waiting for her to catch up, and Ginny crept closer, closer, until she was at the door herself. The snake hissed, and she almost thought it sounded impatient, although she could not discern what exactly it was saying without Tom’s help, and apparently he did not want to help.

 

Without realizing it, she merely followed the snake into the room, eyes widening as it slithered up a couch cushion to wrap around a frail, skeletal man-thing. She had never seen anything like it: a thing that was not quite human, but rather looked as though it were near death. A drab, scruffy man knelt beside the couch, back hunched over and clearly cowering before the other.

 

They both stopped talking the moment Ginny entered the room, and for a second, she thought they could see her. Something here was very, very wrong, but she could not place it, could not begin to comprehend. She wanted to run but felt stuck to the spot.

 

“We are not alone,” the admittedly gross-looking man-thing rasped out. “Wormtail, check the perimeter. Kill any unwelcome guests.”

 

“Yes, my lord.”

 

Bile rose in Ginny’s throat. That _thing_ was Lord Voldemort.

 

Wormtail stood and walked straight through Ginny’s body like she wasn’t even there. She nearly sighed. They couldn’t see her. But then why had Voldemort sensed that they weren’t alone?

 

“My own magic,” the Dark Lord said, raspy voice laced with wonder. His eyes, bright red slits, turned and stared right at her. Ginny tensed, but found she couldn’t make herself move. His frail, bony hand raised his infamous yew wand towards her.

 

_This is how I die,_ she thought, hysteria rising. _In some sort of bizarre dream-scape with Lord Voldemort._

 

Warm arms wrapped around her waist from behind none too gently, and tugged _hard_. She found herself tumbling backwards, not only out of the room, but out of the dream entirely.

 

She bolted upright in bed, panting. Sweat slicked her skin, plastered her red hair to her forehead. Instinctively, she reached for her wand, but even as she cast a quick lumos, she knew she was already back in her bed in the Gryffindor tower.

 

“Tom?” she called out in her mind, praying to Merlin he would be there.

 

For a moment, he was silent as a small warmth spread through her body from head to toe, banishing the tension in muscles.

 

“We will talk about this tomorrow.” Before Ginevra could protest his quiet, but firm command, he sent another wave of warmth to her and she sunk back on her bed, drifting into a dreamless sleep.

 

* * *

 

 

“It wasn’t a normal dream, was it?” Ginny asked during a lull in History of Magic. Binns was dry as a ten-year-old fruitcake on a normal day, and impossible to listen to when there were far more important things to discuss.

 

Tom hummed in agreement. “I think not. I believe we were in a memory of some sort, though that would not explain how my…older self sensed your presence or my magic within you. If it were merely a memory, that would not have happened. If it were merely a dream…no, it was too specific. Too random.”

 

“Dreams can be random,” Ginny protested, but it was a weak argument. She knew her own mind likely could have never concocted the bizarre scene she had witnessed last night. “Or maybe it’s prophetic.”

 

Tom made sure she knew he was rolling his eyes.

 

“You’re no seer, Ginevra.” He paused, thinking it over for a moment. “The most likely conclusion is that Voldemort’s return to the mortal plane is somewhat recent, considering this has never happened before. The disgusting homunculus he was inhabiting is likely not very stable, and will not hold up for more than a year or so. Nor will he be content to stay in that form for longer than necessary.”

 

Ginny could hear Tom’s disgust for what his older self had become and couldn’t help being a little smug about it. For all Tom’s plans of grandeur, he was seeing proof – albeit shaky proof – that his efforts had been for naught. Small karmic justice, she thought.

 

“As I am, technically, a piece of his soul –“ and at this point, Tom sounded grudging enough that Ginny could assume he was displeased by the fact that he had to openly admit a connection to the man-thing he’d referred to as a homunculus – “I suspect that the dream was more of a soul connection. Hence why you were there as well.”

 

“Because we’re soul-bound,” she said, enjoying the annoyance that flashed through Tom’s half of the bond.

 

“Precisely. We’ll have to be careful. I don’t want him knowing that I’m alive.”

 

Ginny smirked. “Not a problem, considering you aren’t exactly alive yet, are you?”

 

Tom’s anger flared through their link, but Ginny only grinned.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello all! I realized that it had been a while since I'd written ANY fanfiction, and even though Power Vacuum Conundrum desperately deserves an update, I decided that Great Minds was calling my attention more and decided to work on it first. Now that we're into the Tri-Wizard Tournament era, Ginny's years are theoretically going to be a little more spread out so I can really getting into her plot and character growth. So even though this chapter didn't feature any of my favorite "Goblet of Fire" moments, those are definitely going to be coming. 
> 
> Anyway, thank you all for continuing to read and to be patient with my updates. I know I'm unreliable and can never really make promises for when updates will happen, but I am trying.
> 
> Comments and Kudos are always, always appreciated! Love you all <3


End file.
